NORA JOHNSON

THIS week I was planning to write about thermoluminescence dating. Quite brief. Provocative. And thrilling.
You’d have loved it.
But then something happened. My blood pressure started rising rapidly. Again.
After weeks of...

Secret Service wants Twitter software

America’s Secret Service is hoping to develop a sarcasm detector for social media site Twitter. They intend to use the software to judge whether to take specific threats posted on social media seriously – or not.

The Department of Homeland Security posted a notice of tender online offering a contract for analytics software which has the ability ‘to detect sarcasm and false positives’.

The Secret Service will also store data including the emotions of internet users and old Tweets.

Currently, the agency uses the Federal Emergency Management Agency's Twitter analysis platform, but they are hoping to improve on this software and its capabilities.

A Secret Service spokesperson said that detecting sarcasm is just one of the features that the software will have.